“The biggest driver in the world of e-commerce today is the marketplace,” said Daniel Korn, CEO of Azrieli.com, speaking at Calcalist’s e-commerce conference.
“We are the operator that combines sellers (individuals or small businesses) and customers. The system knows how to significantly increase variety and sales. It also allows for switching between different categories, customers, and products.”
Korn noted that 56% of all e-commerce in the world today operates on marketplace platforms. “In recent years, the field has been growing more than e-commerce as a whole. Even specifically within Amazon, one of the pioneers, the marketplace’s share of sales has grown from one-third to two-thirds in the last decade.”
Korn explained that “the marketplace field is particularly suitable for times of challenges and economic crisis because the barriers to entry are lower. During the previous economic crisis, many marketplace platforms appeared, including Uber and Airbnb. This is due to the fact that the marketplace is a platform that knows how to operate with less capital and fewer investments, providing a significant advantage.”
According to him, “the platform also helps small businesses that have to deal with marketing costs and the tightening of privacy policies. They know how to rely on large platforms to do this for them, giving these businesses a huge comparative advantage. Beyond that, this platform helps find additional sales channels.”
And what about Israel?
“We still have a low penetration rate, with not many marketplace platforms – we are one of the only ones in Israel, and there is not much presence of major international players.
“One reason is that the supply chain in Israel is very local; we do not serve the surrounding countries. On the other hand, there is very high local demand for e-commerce. Studies show that Israelis are number one in the world in cross-border orders. So, on one hand, the industry is less developed, but there is a very strong demand. Within this vacuum, there is a great opportunity for a strong local player, and this is where we come in.”
The core of Azrieli.com’s strategy is the marketplace. “The front is our sellers. We want to be a seller-friendly and involved marketplace. Seller-friendly means we treat our sellers as customers first and provide them with everything we can. As for being involved, the Israeli consumer will receive the answer from us – the shipping, the customer service, the website’s features, and lastly, the marketplace is our opportunity to offer a wide variety of products at the hundreds of thousands level, where all categories can be found.”
So what can the marketplace offer?
“All the tools required in e-commerce: the platform, marketing, multiple payment options, responsiveness to sellers, round-the-clock customer service, traffic, marketing capabilities, and promotions. We know how to provide data and insights across different areas.”
Korn concluded – “We actually give the sellers almost everything. They need to focus on the physical product – they have three things: good products, a catalog that provides the right information, and the ability to handle orders. We will take care of everything else. We see that this usually increases sales by 30-40%. We also understand the needs and know how to build in the right way to serve these businesses.”
Azrieli.com has undergone significant changes in recent years. “We have redesigned our website to cater to the needs of homes and families, offering everything a family needs for the summer, moving house, and the perfect trip. We do this through the marketplace, which offers a variety of products from different categories.
“We have been in the marketplace world for over ten years and deeply understand the customers’ needs. We have over 150,000 products, and every few months, that number doubles because we have increased the number of our sellers – we have hundreds of sellers. We know how to grow two, three, or four times with the technology we have implemented. We attract a million and a half visitors a month, and we are part of the Azrieli group, which has 20 malls in Israel with five million visitors a month. We are planning collaborations with the malls.”
